STORRS — The temptation to pin most of UConn's football woes on the offensive line is overwhelming. Offense is the sexy part of the game, and the Huskies are the lonely folks at the dance, waiting forlornly in the corner for somebody to come along.

But it's not as if the defensive line is a supermodel with dates lined up from here to eternity.

Which brings us to possibly the most frightening UConn statistic in a plethora of them: Sacks. UConn quarterbacks have been sacked 31 times in six games. The Huskies have sacked opposing quarterbacks five times yes, five in six games.

Opponents are averaging more sacks per game than UConn's total for the season. Stephen King would have trouble writing something as horrific.

"We've talked about trying to get more pressure on the quarterback," interim head coach T.J. Weist said. "We have to find ways to get to the quarterback. We know it's an issue. We're working on ways to get that done."

Those ways are a secret, but there is clearly no magic elixir. Defensive ends Tim Willman, Jesse Joseph, Angelo Pruitt and Reuben Frank have one sack between them. That came from Frank, who was a fullback until this season. Tackles Julian Campenni and Shamar Stephen each have a sack, with the other two belonging to linebackers Yawin Smallwood and Jefferson Ashiru.

Certainly allowing 31 sacks points out the trouble the offensive line has had, but the defensive numbers in that category are alarming. UConn's reputation was made on a strong running game and a defense that brought pressure and stopped running games.

This defense gets no pressure and can't stop the run, which makes the offense look that much worse. Whatever woes the offense had in prior years were often masked somewhat by a strong defense. The masks are off now, all exposed to the point of the emperor having no clothes.

"It's been very frustrating," Pruitt said, "because we have set goals in forcing turnovers and getting sacks, and with us not getting enough pass pressure, that puts a lot more pressure on our (defensive backs). Once you see that they have to cover for three, four, five seconds, that makes us want to work on the pass rush that much harder.

"We have to recognize when they're in pass formation sets so that gives us a quicker edge and come off the snap a lot harder, a lot faster than we normally do."

There are many reasons why UConn quarterbacks Chandler Whitmer and Tim Boyle have been sacked, some of their own doing and some of the offensive line's doing. Boyle might be able to correct some of that with experience but the offensive line's woes might be mostly beyond fixing.

It's difficult to understand why the guys on the defensive front have had trouble getting pressure. The Huskies lost all-time sacks leader Trevardo Williams and linebacker Sio Moore, who accounted for 19.5 sacks combined last year. But Pruitt, Smallwood, Campenni, Willman and Joseph all had at least one last year.

No pressure has meant quarterbacks picking apart UConn's secondary, which is often left with the difficult task of covering receivers for long periods of time. In the next two games, the Huskies will face the American Athletic Conference's two best quarterbacks in Blake Bortles of Central Florida and Louisville's Teddy Bridgewater. If the Huskies can't get some pressure on them, the games could get ugly in a hurry.

Simply hitting quarterbacks more than they have would help the Huskies.

"We have to get pressure and hits on the quarterback," Weist said. "We're constantly challenging them. We have the personnel up front to do it. Every week we have a challenge for different positions. This week our challenge is on the defensive front to get some pressure on (Bortles). This quarterback is the strength of their team."

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